The Significance of Cookies
by Lawless67
Summary: Sequel to Three Reasons, AU. Sam contemplates the man his brother has become, and finds that he likes the woman responsible.


A/N: So I decided I wanted to maybe continue a few glimpses into the Winchesters' lives with Remington. I needed to have some Rem and Sam interaction, and also explore how they function as a family unit. So yeah. Sam and Dean don't belong to me, only Rem. Read on, please review.

Pissed doesn't begin to cover what she feels right now.

Rationally, she knows that she may be overreacting; that even the crappiness of her day thus far doesn't call for the heights her anger is currently taking. She knows that lately her emotions have dragged her through a never-ending roller coaster, that one minute she is a completely balanced human being with a high school diploma, even a partial degree under her belt, and the next she is a raging, hormonal lunatic. She is reasonable. She knows this.

And yet, for some unfathomable reason, she is still sobbing into a dishtowel because she forgot to take the damned cookies out of the oven and they now resemble pieces of charcoal.

Pregnancy is a bitch.

The kitchen is a disaster, dirty dishes from breakfast piled high in the sink—because of course neither of the two grown men in this house can demote themselves to the level of dishwasher. The counters are splattered with what appears to be ketchup or blood, she can't be sure. On the table, the flowers Dean gave her yesterday are already sadly wilted, and smoke wreaths the air while the stove timer beeps incessantly.

And Remington, capable, independent woman that she is, can only cry into the blackened towel.

She takes several deep breaths, trying to calm herself, but the smoke is so thick she could practically cut it up and serve it for dessert instead of her ruined snicker doodles. She ends up choking on her own failure, water streaming from eyes reddened by the infernal tears and smoke.

She thanks God and whoever else might be listening that Dean is at the store right now, banished from the premises by her order until he comes back with pickle juice or learns how to walk on water. The half-bewildered, half-patronizing expression he wore when she slammed the door in his face half an hour earlier only added to her ire.

Both Sam and Dean have worn that expression a lot lately. She knows she's been difficult the last couple months, but neither of them have been a picnic either. Dean has been surprisingly patient throughout her pregnancy, rarely raising his voice to match hers. But the calm, reasonable tone he uses makes her want to seriously consider murder. He's taken to walking out in the middle of their fights, barricading himself in the barn, where he tinkers with some engine or the other until he deems it safe to return. She's been itching for one of their good old screaming, blow the roof off, you're-sleeping-on-the-couch fights—the ones that raise the blood and clear the head and call for some good old fashioned making up later—but Dean has been handling her with kid gloves since she first started to show about two months ago. Sam, still reserved and withdrawn from the memories of hell that torment him, only listens to her tirades with wide, sorrowful eyes that rip her to pieces with guilt. He never tries to reason with her, only retreats with a muttered apology to the attic, where he has made his haven among the dusty piles of books and artifacts. She—armed with the peace offering of cookies—often finds him there later, when the guilt has practically eaten her alive and she has temporarily transformed back into her normal self.

Sam's cookies are burnt now, shriveled like her cold, unfeeling heart.

God, she's horrible. What kind of person kicks their husband out of the house for asking if she wanted the yard mowed? And poor Sam, all he'd done was comment that the mayonnaise in the fridge was expired. She is officially a monster.

Amidst the discovery of her own bitchiness and the fresh wave of tears it causes, she finally has the presence of mind to turn off the stove timer. The sooty towel is smells horrible and is only contributing to the watering of her eyes, so she turns to throw it in the hamper.

Sam is standing at the bottom of the stairs, staring at the chaos.

Rem hurriedly swipes the back of her hand across her eyes. "Oh, Sam, honey, I didn't see you there. Did you come down for cookies?"

Sam turns his eyes to her, this woman that Dean loves so much. She seems unsure of what to do with her left hand, fingers fluttering, the dropped dishtowel now in a heap on the floor, the right one rests on the underside of her swollen belly. Her hair escapes the bun she'd put it in, sweaty curls sticking to the nape of her neck. Her eyes are red and puffy from the crying jag she's trying to pretend he didn't just walk in on, and her lower lip trembles on the word "cookies."

Without a word, Sam strides to the two windows and the back door, pulling each open. As the smoke begins to clear, he walks back to the oven, removing the lumps that used to be cookies and dumping them unceremoniously into the trash.

Remington makes a small sound of distress. Sam, still quiet, takes her small hand gently in his and leads her to the kitchen table, guiding her into a chair. He pats her hand briefly, warning her to stay put, and begins to methodically clean the mountain of dishes in the sink.

Words aren't easy for Sam after the apocalypse. Sometimes he wakes up from nightmares where he literally screamed himself mute, is terrified that it's actually true. He can talk; it's just that most times he doesn't need to. He's with Dean, and Dean has always understood him just fine without the talk. Most times he's content to watch and listen, to Dean and Remington for the most part. They can entertain him for hours, with or without words. Rem is still relatively new to him, but her presence in their lives isn't intrusive like he'd imagined a woman's would be, back before. He finds he likes the way she fits with Dean, is beginning to like the way she fits with him, too.

He likes what she does to Dean, how she seems to rile him up and smooth his edges all at once. How she brings out that man Sam hasn't seen consistently in years, the one who raised him, who taught him that love doesn't require words.

He loves his brother, all sides of him, but Rem brings out the best of him. The man his brother is with her wakes that trembling part of Sam, stirs the ashes of his faith and makes him think that maybe he wasn't so wrong when he believed something bigger was out there watching over them. Because Dean is everything good Sam has ever known.

He finishes with the dishes, puts them away, and wipes at the ketchup/blood stains on the counter. The smoke has mostly cleared out by now, and he turns to check on Rem.

She is no longer sitting at the table.

Assuming she has gone to clean up in the bathroom, he startles when he feels a small hand at his lower back. Rem is standing at his elbow, a tin of oatmeal cookies she must have retrieved from the pantry held out to him.

"I thought Dean had eaten the last of them, but there's a few left. I know they're not your favorite, but after this morning…well." The tiny smile she offers him causes her one dimple to wink, though her eyes are still red. She shoves the tin at him, pushing him towards the chair she's recently vacated when he takes it. As he sits and chews on a cookie, she fusses around the counter, straightening and rearranging.

The flowers on the table droop pitifully. Rem stands beside Sam's chair, picks up the vase with one hand. Feeling much calmer, she runs the other hand through Sam's hair, as much to soothe herself as him. It's something she started doing when Sam first allowed her touch him, and she doesn't push him for more.

But today is different. Because, today, without warning, Sam's arms are suddenly wrapped around her, his head leaning against her ribs, and the belly, her hand still in his hair. Rem is left reeling with the feel of her heart breaking and becoming whole in the same moment. There are no words for this feeling, and for the first time she completely understands Sam's silence.

Sam's arms are neither loose nor tight, but comfortably there, as if he is just reassuring himself that she is real. The baby kicks, and they both feel it, but he doesn't move, only rubs his face a little into her side, content to feel Dean's child move against him.

Dean finds them like that, leaning on each other.


End file.
